Allegedly a tax raise would scare away the workers somewhere

[feargach]

Tax hikes 'will exile well paid' - Lenihan - National News, Frontpage - Independent.ie

However, the Department of Finance briefing document, which has the headline "taxation statistics brief", outlines in stark detail the potential risks to specific tax changes facing Mr Lenihan.

It states: "The higher that marginal tax rates are increased, the more likely we are to lose high-income earners. The consequence of losing one worker from the top 1 per cent of income earners means that we would likely have to take an additional 132 workers into the tax net."

What I am not clear on is where these tax-shy wealthsters are expected to scatter to? Switzerland? Well, if you are comfortable upping sticks to a place where property taxes are huge and where you need French and/or German to make friends, it strikes me that we're likely not looking at huge numbers going there.

USA? Lower income taxes, but major property taxes again. No state-provided health care of any kind for you, once you factor in the cost of the private insurance you need that will actually cover you if you get sick, there's no benefit.

Cayman islands? Life there isn't all that cheap, they charge their tax-hatin' guests top dollar for the necessities of life.

France, Germany? Already charge over 50% of income for top earners.

Russia? Low nominal taxes, the real money is in the bribes you need to pay dozens of officials to keep operating and not end up in Siberia on trumped-up evidence.

[feargach]

Also, how mobile are Ireland's wealthy really?

Surely a large chunk of the 100K-plus crowd are execs in foreign firms who are here for the low corporate tax rate. So those guys can't really go anywhere else.

A further chunk are public sector types like consultants, and they won't score Irish-style payouts anywhere else on earth.

No doubt there are some big earners who can realistically relocate, but enough to counteract the income from the less-mobile wealthy who are stuck here in the medium term.

[mr_anderson]

So long as their jobs remain, I'm ok with them leaving.

[Sync]

Posted this in another thread but:

Banks in England are hiring mid to top level experienced people, the financial sector in Switzerland is still going strongly and hiring, New Zealand and Australia are out of recession and hiring as well, as are Canada. There are certainly options there.

The worry would not primarily be the guys on 5 million plus leaving, it's the brain drain that would result from many of the folks on 100k upwards with successful private sector management backgrounds leaving.

Also keep in mind the cost of living in the UK, States and down under is much cheaper than here.

[20000miles]

This debate has taken a sad turn. Instead of pointing out the blatantly obvious; that taxes consume wealth, the debate shifts into discussion about rich people leaving.

If Europe were divided into a hundred, or even several dozen mini-states, the cost of up and leaving would be minimal, and hence the temptation of these states to suck the wealth out of the economy would be reduced. A doublegood win.

[Aristodemus]

A disgraceful statement by any Minister for Finance.

[petervalhala]

A disgraceful statement by any Minister for Finance.

It's common sense, why punish people who work hard, take risks and generate employment?

Also a married couple, both working, are normally classified as a single tax payer according to the revenue, a couple earning 60k each are not high earners, but a typical teacher married to a nurse

[cyberianpan]

As pointed out by Ronan Lyons- say here- we already have a highly progressive tax system, with the median earner paying a mere 4% tax

Karl Whelan also analyzed this issue lately pointing out that such a proposal is largely self-defeating

Exclusive of employer's PRSI the marginal rate is effectively 54% , with the forthcoming PRSI ceiling abolitions this will be more like 64%

If you examine the rates of tax on earnings:


You will see a slight fall off beginning at between the €231 and 650k mark, this is chiefly as it is starting to become cost effective to avoid tax (pay an accountant etc)

There is actually very little money to be made from tax increases on the rich, rather instead it is time to tax the low earners again- a person on the median wage paying 4% tax is crazy





cYp

[ManOfReason]

Tax hikes 'will exile well paid' - Lenihan - National News, Frontpage - Independent.ie
USA? Lower income taxes, but major property taxes again. No state-provided health care of any kind for you, once you factor in the cost of the private insurance you need that will actually cover you if you get sick, there's no benefit.

These guys are not worried about 20-30K in property tax, or using our useless state provided health care (most of them would be on a plane to the U.S. or London if they had anything more serious than a sprained ankle) Even if their companies did not pay their health insurance in the U.S. (which of course they would) they would have no problem coughing it up themselves. We are not talking about district sales managers here.

[cyberianpan]

As pointed out by Ronan Lyons- say here- we already have a highly progressive tax system, with the median earner paying a mere 4% tax

Karl Whelan also analyzed this issue lately pointing out that such a proposal is largely self-defeating

Exclusive of employer's PRSI the marginal rate is effectively 54% , with the forthcoming PRSI ceiling abolitions this will be more like 64%

If you examine the rates of tax on earnings:


You will see a slight fall off beginning at between the €231 and 650k mark, this is chiefly as it is starting to become cost effective to avoid tax (pay an accountant etc)

There is actually very little money to be made from tax increases on the rich, rather instead it is time to tax the low earners again- a person on the median wage paying 4% tax is crazy



Furthermore it is also the low-medium earners who earn the greatest unjustified premium in the public sector:

ESRI
Furthermore, we found that by 2006 senior public service workers earned almost 8 per cent more than their private sector counterparts, while those in lower-level grades earned between 22 and 31 per cent more. T

So the answer is to
1) Increase taxes on low-middle earners
2) Cut the pay of low to middle earners in the PS
3) Other spending cuts (social welfare , etc)


cYp